It’s Not You, It’s Me.

Life. Life is insane, crazy, busy, every variety of that word that you can think of. There are not enough hours in the day and I’m not sure I’d even really want more because from my current schedule I’m EXHAUSTED.

You would think I have no friends in Los Angeles because I am never hanging out with anyone. I’m not having play dates, I’m not having brunch out on Sunday or clubbing it up Friday night. I get messages; “Can you hang out?” “Where have you been?” “Let’s get together.” “Let’s plan something soon!” “Want to meet for lunch?”

These messages oddly, as enticing as they are, give me extreme anxiety lately. I don’t deny that I miss my friends, I miss adult conversations and getting some time to just myself but the reality is I simply don’t have the time right now. I have another priority in my life. My daughter. She needs me the most.

Full time job, full time Mom, full time responsibilities around the clock.  I’m up early in the morning, getting myself and a 3 year old ready for school, trying to get her to eat a decent breakfast while deciding if my hair is acceptable in a ponytail or bun today…cause really who’s got time for style? But I can assure you Aubrey looks FABULOUS. She often walks out of the house with a super cute hairstyle AND a bow. (Brush those shoulders off). Rush to preschool drop off where I know I won’t see my daughter for almost 9 hours. 9 HOURS. I love the days when it’s less than that. I do absolutely love my job and it provides for my family. We get by. (Don’t even get me started on the cost of preschool…..ABSURD. They take half my pay.)

Preschool pickup. I used to drive straight there and get her. Lately I’ve been trying to figure out how to work exercise back into my life to tackle the pounds I’ve gained this year. What does pick up now entail? Drive home, QUICK change and take the pre-assembled jogging stroller out of the SUV and run the mile to school to get her. I am fully equipped with water, a snack and music pod for the obvious Disney playlist to listen to as we trek the mile back home. BAM. 2 mile exercise added into the day. Once home, it’s time to attempt to make a dinner I am totally unprepared for every day. I surprise myself on what I can whip up. I can turn plain chicken nuggets into a glorious chicken parmesan with spaghetti and use the Ninja to turn mozzarella sticks into a glorious melted cheese topping. In between I’m making sure she gets her homework done on the 3 nights a week she has it assigned. (Thank God we aren’t into the difficult things. I’m all for letters, numbers, coloring and connecting the dots right now)

If I consume dinner by myself. 5 minutes. 10 minutes, if I was to take my time. But dinner in my house can take minimum 1 hour. The concept of sitting still doesn’t resonate with 3 year olds. I anticipate I make probably 1,543 negotiations a day, more on the weekend. With dishes left to be done, food to put away, I still try to spend time with my daughter whether it’s playing games with her, maybe relaxing and watching a kids show of her choice on TV and reading books before bedtime. I just missed nearly an entire day with her. And now I have to get her bathed, ready for bed and go through the whole bedtime routine to do this all over again the next day. When she does finally fall asleep, there is so much to be done in the house. Crazy how fast toys get sprawled out, uniforms need to be washed, those dishes are still hanging out in the sink and my cat is crying at me for some sort of attention or head nod to acknowledge that she still exists in my life. By the time it’s all done, I’m collapsing into bed.

The week is so hectic so by the time the weekend comes I value my time with my daughter so much. I try to find something exciting to do and if the weather is nice, we always try to hit the beach once a weekend. It’s our sanctuary. Rolling in the sand and jumping in the waves can

cure just about anything. Sheer bliss.

Call me selfish, I like the weekend to be ours. It is also family time. With my work schedule and her dad’s being so opposite, we don’t get time together as much as we would like. So on the rare occasion we get an entire weekend day TOGETHER, better believe I’m soaking in every moment of it!

My daughter is 3…..she doesn’t want to brunch, she doesn’t want to go shopping or just hang around the house all day catching up. She is growing, constantly learning and needing her Mommy to simply spend time with her. Being away from the one I love most the majority of the day for 5 days a week can be unbearable sometimes. It’s not easy.  So I’m not trying to be selfish and I’m not avoiding you. I’m just busy. Busy making memories, busy painting, creating chalk artwork on the pavement, having a dance party at 8am with a strobe light, snuggling on the couch watching a movie I’ve seen hundreds of times or teaching my daughter how to ride a bike. I’m busy trying to make up for all the hours I have missed during the week and that I will never get back again in my lifetime.

She is growing way too fast before my eyes. I am beyond exhausted from juggling everything and I’ve had to make decisions about what and who is most important to me these days. So please the next time I take forever to respond to a text message (I’m terrible at those) or return a call weeks later or push off another attempt at “catching up” because my daughter may be in a “mood” (you have no idea what those are like at this age! WHEW!) please don’t take it personally. It’s not you, it’s ME. 

“I think we dream so we don’t have to be apart for so long. If we’re in each other’s dreams, we can be together all the time.” 

― A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

Dear Mom...

As I went to fill out a Mother’s Day card for my mom this year I started off as any other would with “Dear Mom”.  Then my pen stopped and lingered as I tried to figure out what to write next. The problem wasn’t that I didn’t know what I wanted to say but I didn’t know HOW to say it in the tiny amount of space available on the card I purchased. I suddenly felt like 5 lines of “thanks” for the 27 years (plus 9 months belly time) of sacrifices you made for me my entire life wasn’t sufficient.

I feel like the best way to say thanks is through a letter, something none of us seem to do much of anymore. I can’t rely on Hallmark to express what I need to for this one…so here goes.

Dear Mom,

Let me start of by recognizing that in the past few years I have not been the best at being outwardly emotional in person. I have had my phase of the half hugs and the turn of my cheek for kisses and I know I’ve told you on countless occasions, “MOM, STOP CRYING.” I do apologize for those moments in time but heck I’m about to make up for it now.

Most women have expressed that the day they give birth to their own child is when they suddenly feel this new connection to their mother that they never had before. There is this new understanding upon officially entering motherhood of one another. And I can agree with that but I think there’s some fluff to it. My daughter, your granddaughter, is about to turn 3. Crazy, right? Where has the time gone? But it’s these YEARS that have brought me to an understanding of what it is to be a Mom and to understand you and the sacrifices you made for me.

You sacrificed your body, your dreams, aspirations, time, sleep, hot dinners, long showers, social life and for goodness sakes your sanity for me.  It wasn’t until I have been doing this myself for years that I could completely comprehend it. And better yet I am doing this with one kid right now and you eventually were sacrificing and taking care of THREE of us. Lord, have mercy on your soul! At this point I can’t even imagine juggling more.

It wasn’t until some of the private moments I had when I saw areas of my body that were permanently affected by childbirth and gave me low self esteem that I understood why you had those moments too. I get it now. Knowing about some of your aspirations you gave up to be a mom breaks my heart in a million pieces because as a dreamer, I get how important those are in life. To give them up is one of the hardest things in the world and until I had to put mine on hold to put my child first, it never phased me how you truly dropped everything for your children.

I know I’ve always made fun of you for heating up your dinner in the microwave after you just put it on the table to make it really hot. Now I’m thinking this is a direct result of previously being the last one in the family to get food on your plate because you were servicing everyone else at the table first! I struggle to get a decent meal half the time on the table on the daily and just about EVERY single night, you enforced family dinners at the dining room table. EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. Not only were we all at the dinner table but also you always seemed to flawlessly whip up some magical meal with a main dish and five sides for a family of five.  That is HARD to do. HARD. I praise the individual who invented the slow cooker and any other magical kitchen device that helps me get a dinner made quicker. You made it seem like nothing as you cooked some seriously amazing mashed potatoes every other night and then auctioned off the beaters to be licked.

Sleep. What is that? Has it happened since all of us kids left the house? I doubt so because I’ll see that you “like” a picture on my Facebook at 12:30am so clearly you’re not catching up! I recall that you’ve always been, go, go, go, go, GO from early morning to late at night. I was curious as to what store you seemed to have gotten that never-ending energizer bunny battery from…. I’ve determined it’s just another “Mom” thing. I think about you everyday and how you didn’t stop as I’m now being woken up at 6am (thankfully sometimes not until 6:30am/6:45am) and not getting a break until I collapse into bed most of the time around midnight. I get the need to just keep going and after dinner is made and the kid is asleep the odd energy to just clean the dishes, make sure all the food is put away, maybe even do some laundry at 11pm! Because I can fit in one more load, just one more! Yet even as I move about getting done the housework I need to, I’m thinking you had the same feeling I get in the back of your head…reality…. I just want to lie down and not move. Forget doing all the housework that is NEVER ENDING…. I just want a break.

This leads me to…SANITY. You raised me not swear, thank you for that. And I didn’t growing up. But as a mother, with a smile on my face, I occasionally have a spew of very inappropriate words that run through my head during the rough times. Times like when my daughter has a “pee-pee” accident in her underwear so I start the washing machine that’s in my apartment kitchen and go to clean her up in the bathroom. Upon returning to put the dirty laundry in the machine, come upon a flooded kitchen because the water hose wasn’t properly installed in the heat of the moment and it popped out onto the floor bringing allllll the running water with it! HOORAY! (In my head… curse word, curse word, curse word) Times like these I want to throw my hands up in the air and run away. Run away, scream, throw something, or hit something…. just go BANANAS. With that said there were plenty of times I thought you were crazy. I legitimately thought my mother must be insane, why is she freaking out of what just happened? Now I know the answer. Because you are a Mom. And you were being a Mom to three of us kids. It was us kids who were being the insane ones, we just were sucking any sanity you had left out of you on many occasions. You weren’t crazy; you were having a Mommy moment. It took me all the times where I want to give up or hide in a corner to get what you went through. I understand.

While the sacrifices are important, I think the value comes in what you gave me. You gave me endless memories of a fun childhood. There were countless crafts, outdoor fun, and the best mac and cheese when I got home from half-day kindergarten, YUM. I’m sure I didn’t express it at 5, but I loved how you made me a new hair clip or ponytail holder every week for school. Whenever we had a new letter of the alphabet we were studying, I waltzed into the classroom with a new hair accessory. You literally made me new hair pieces multiple times a week and the extent of the work you did only came to light to me now.  I’m also pretty confident everyone looked forward to my birthday the most at school because you always made one giant cookie pie for the class, which was my favorite thing EVER. Can you make me one now?

You taught me about life from manners to my morals, values and faith in God. Those things shaped me, made me the person I am today and for that I am forever grateful. There isn’t enough to thank you for what you did for me while raising me, without writing an entire book.

Thank you for changing my poopy butt, enduring my spit up and attending the nights where I decided I just wanted to party at 2am with you and only you.

Thank you for your magic kisses that made my boo-boos better and for always being the best nurse I could ask for when I was sick.

Thank you for cleaning up my vomit. That is disgusting. Absolutely horrendous and you did it countless times.

Thank you for dealing with my sensitive skin issues and adjusting the entire laundry routine to make sure there was no dye or perfume in the detergent.

Thank you for helping me with my homework, my education and for always being a chaperone on my field trips.

Thank you for being at every school play or activity I participated in, you were always my number one cheerleader.

Thank you for every meal you cooked and all the laundry you did, especially all the dirty softball uniforms you had to wash! (I’m sure you cringed on the inside every time I slid into a base.) 

I could go on and on but most importantly THANK YOU for being my Mom. I am the luckiest daughter. I only hope I can be half the Mother to Aubrey you were to me.  The crafts, the cooking, the creative activities I try to do with her, I channel you. I try to think, what would my Mom do? I understand what you have gone through as a Mother and I understand that no matter how tired you are, the energy, the motivation all comes from LOVE. That’s what Super Moms are made of….Love. You live it and you give it. You live for the smiles and the joys of your child’s life. So I’ll stop telling you not to cry because I know they are proud Mommy tears. I understand those emotions because they get me all the time! Suddenly I cry for no reason at all besides the immense, overwhelming love I have for my child. I never knew I could be so proud the moment my child banished me from her potty routine to do it all by herself. The things that seem so small are the biggest things in life now.

I wouldn’t be where I am today without you. I love you. I appreciate you more than ever now and I understand. For all that you’ve done and all that you’ve been to me, Happy Mother’s Day.

I hope you have the most relaxing day that you so truly deserve.

Love Always,

Marissa

"MY MOMMY! IT’S MY MOMMY!!!"

6 weeks. It took 6 weeks too long to get everything set up. Mind you amid starting a new full time job, finding a place to live, purchasing a car, finding a preschool, moving into a new apartment and purchasing/transporting furniture since I had nothing, this seems like a reasonable and somewhat quick amount of time to get everything done in. But to me, it was a lifetime. A lifetime away from my daughter. I missed Christmas with her, New Year’s…things I felt like I couldn't get back. (But fully intended to recreate Christmas in our new apartment!)

Getting back to Atlanta, I wish the plane could have flown FASTER. Aubrey didn't know I was coming back that day. When I came to the door and rang the doorbell (I wish I could have had her face filmed!!) she did a triple take. Confusion followed by sheer excitement and disbelief. She yelled, “MY MOMMY, IT’S MY MOMMY!!” I've never seen her like that before. I could see how much she had missed me and it was the best hug I think I ever had with her because there was so much emotion in it. We just needed to have a good long embrace that was long overdue. I MISSED HER SO MUCH!

I feel like she grew SO much in such a short time. And she just kept showing me all the Christmas decorations and everything she had been doing with Grandma and Abuelo while I was away. Now I flew in on a Friday and was leaving that Sunday afternoon so it was a QUICK trip. Since I was flying Southwest Airlines, each passenger can fly two bags free. So you better believe I was still hauling four more suitcases full of things I left behind back to California. My body also decided that it was a good time to catch a nasty cold. I almost didn't get on the plane Sunday but forced myself so that we could just get back and then I would get better once home.

We got back LATE. Sometime after midnight, it was a LONG day of traveling. Aubrey was SO excited to see “Aubrey’s house” and she lit up walking in and being reunited with her toys and belongings and most importantly HER BED. Over the 6 weeks we were apart, she was not happy with me for taking her bed! It was pretty humorous. She constantly reminded me that, “Mommy took my bed!” (insert toddler sour puss face). I worked from home the next day so she could adjust to the new place and new time zone. I took her to visit her preschool down the road which SHE surprisingly asked me to do! The RELIEF I had that my baby girl was finally here in Los Angeles with me, we were finally together was unreal. I was so excited for what was ahead for us.

At work, next to my desk I have a small column that juts out and I call it my “motivation wall.” The only thing on it are pictures of Aubrey. If I ever have a rough day, miss her at preschool or just need that boost, I look at it and am reminded of why I am doing what I am doing, and why I have pushed myself through all these barriers to get to this point. I am doing this for her. To give HER a better life, a fulfilled life with endless opportunities. To show her that she can be anything she wants to be and that women are strong, successful leaders.  My goal is to strive to be the best role model I can for her and the strongest woman in her life. Because someday I hope to be receiving a recognition for my impact at work, maybe a promotion, maybe my own company or any other important life milestone that my daughter will be there and she will proudly be saying, “My Mommy, It’s My Mommy.”